Welcome back to How I Parent, where we speak to families, about how they’re raising their kids.
This week we hear from pole dancers Lindsey Teall and Jake Night, and their daughters Rosalyn, nine, and Alaura, 11.
The couple met while working as dancers, and it’s a talent they’ve passed down to their children.
Now, the family pole-dance together. Lindsey and Jake say it makes their children more open-minded while building mental and physical strength — but not everyone has been so supportive.
Using poles as a tool for sport actually has a long history. Mallakhamb (a type of Indian gymnastics on a vertical pole) has been practiced since the 12th century, and was even part of the Berlin 1936 Olympics. Poles have also been used in European circus acts since the 19th century.
But for many, pole dancing conjures up images of bikini-clad performers. While an incredibly difficult skill to master, pole-dancing has become synonymous with sex. In fact, both Lindsey and Jake themselves have worked as erotic dancers.
It’s for this reason that the pair have received death threats from people who object to their young daughters pole-dancing. They’ve been accused of bad parenting – but Lindsey is adamant they’ve done nothing wrong.
She says people are ‘close-minded’ and she wants to remove the ‘stigma’ attached to pole dancing, which she calls an ‘art form’. She’s determined to prove that poles aren’t just for the clubs – but that it’s sport in its own right.
And she’s not wrong – pole is a growing sport around the world, and the International Pole Sports Federation (IPSF) was founded in 2009 with the aim to get the sport Olympic Recognition. According to the IPSF, there are now 3000 athletes competing across the world at an Olympic standard.
What to wear for pole dancing
Whether you’ve seen someone pole dance on stage, at the circus or in the gym, you’ve probably noticed one thing: they don’t seem to be wearing much clothing.
But, there’s actually a reason for that. Bare skin is much better at gripping onto the pole than soft fabrics, which is why you often see performers in just shorts and a sports bra.
You also want your clothing to be tight fitting, so you don’t have to worry about excess fabric getting in the way.
That being said, turning up to a pole dance class in defacto underwear can feel pretty daunting, and any class should be happy for you to wear your usual gym gear to get you started.
The 38-year-old, who lives in St Louis, Missouri, says, ‘The girls have now been pole-dancing since they were very small, Alaura started when she was two years old and Roz was eight months old.
‘I’d be teaching classes in the studio and she’d be pulling herself up on the pole.
‘The pole was their playground and they’ve been learning for so many years that they are now as trained as some adult professionals. I even pole-danced when I was pregnant with them.’
Lindsey and Jake now no longer work in clubs, but pole dance as a form of exercise – they also teach pole and enter into competitions. The family are skilled at many aerial arts, including hammock and silks, hoop, the pole and even trapeze.
Lindsey, who studied dance at degree level, says, ‘The girls are a lot like other kids, they just want to do fun things, but their fun things are hoop and pole.
‘When they work, they work really hard.
‘They do a lot of training sporadically throughout the day, because they like to jump on the pole. They probably spend around two hours daily on it.
‘We don’t actually decide what they are going to do, they decide, it’s very hands off. We are there to make sure they do it properly. We give them guidance, teach them tricks and how to do things safely.
‘I do worry about them hurting themselves and they don’t try new tricks by themselves, but so far we’ve been mainly okay and I can oversee their training at home.’
Jake, 42, adds: ‘With Lindsey’s dance background and my training in gymnastics and acrobatics, they were always going to be active children.
‘They quickly gained new skills because they were so young and now they are at an intermediate to advanced level.
‘If they want to do it as a job, they will be far above everyone else and they’ve had adults asking them to teach them tricks. But they don’t have to do it.’
Jake adds that the training has boosted the girls’ confidence. ‘It’s the “if I can do that, I can do anything” mentality,’ he explains. ‘Learning to hang upside down from a pole takes time, effort and patience and you can transfer that into whatever you want in life.’
The family have contacts within the industry from their decades of dancing and as a result, the girls have been asked to run classes or workshops for other young pole-dancers.
And Alaura and Roz are proud of their achievements.
Alaura says, ‘All of our friends are impressed by our skills.’
But Lindsey disagrees. She says, ‘Some of their friends are influenced by their parents and are therefore pretty close minded.’
When the family first launched their social media channel five years ago, they were astonished by the backlash they received.
Lindsey says, ‘People saw us pole-dancing together as a family and we would receive some death threats. People had a lot of preconceived notions and attitudes about what we were doing, and still do to some extent.’
At first, people threatened to report the family to the child protective services to have the children removed, and while nothing came of the threats, Lindsey says the judgement from others contributed to her decision to home-school the girls.
She says, ‘I wanted them to keep their innocence for as long as possible and not be affected by the attitudes of others who have more conservative beliefs.
‘Currently Alaura wants to run her own daycare and Rosalyn wants to work with animals, but if they decide not to do that then they have a good skill to fall back on.’
And the group enjoy performing all together for their social media channels.
Jake says, ‘We love to perform as a family but like in anything, the girls are quite independent in what they do.
‘We are trying to get them to put a performance together but there is a lot of sibling rivalry!’
Lindsey’s eldest son Aiden, from a previous relationship, had also enjoyed dancing too, before deciding he wanted to live with his father, a decision Lindsey is very relaxed about.
She says, ‘We never force the children to do anything they don’t want to do, it’s entirely up to them. We just want them to enjoy it and learn to follow their own paths.
‘Five years ago we were leading the way, we were pioneers, and we took a lot of heat. Now more kids are coming into pole-dancing and I’m so happy to see that.
‘We see more kids being physically active which is great and it takes away the stigma which is still attached to pole-dancing.’
The family move between the Midwest and Texas, where the girls attend a circus school.
And their social media is full of videos of the girls enthusiastically practising different skills or at competitions and displays.
Rosalyn adds, ‘I just ignore the haters. Pole taught me how to do backflips without getting too scared.’
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